As Jason reported earlier today, defenseman Scott Ford has been reacquired, and Jani Lajunen has been sent to St. Louis/Peoria. Just as surprising to me is that Patrick Cehlin has been sent to Cincy in the ECHL (along with Taylor Aronson). Not surprising in that Cehlin deserved to be sent down….I’m surprised that he actually WAS sent down.

First…Fordo and Lajunen. Two guys that had been spending more time in suits than jerseys lately. Lajunen had been a healthy scratch since January 26th, except for the game on Saturday when Taylor Beck was a late scratch. Tough to look at his stats and argue that he was a victim of a numbers game. His game just didn’t take the step forward in this sophomore season that it needed to. He had one goal and four assists, and was -9 defensively in 40 games.

Fordo has played in just one game since January 23rd. The -14 defensive rating kind of jumps out at you, but look at that team….Only one of their D-men is on the plus side for the season right now. And if the D-men aren’t getting much cooperation from their forwards (Hensick -10, Nesbitt -9, Schwartz -14, McRae -11, Grachev -12), Ford’s numbers might take a dip like that. Sure he’s a year older, but I definitely don’t think he is as bad as that -14 suggests. Even with as many veterans as Peoria has on their roster, I was very surprised that they would bench their captain like they did. But good on them for moving him to a place where he’ll get the chance to play.

Taylor Aronson has exceeded my expectations this season, but I still feel more comfortable with Fordo back on the blue line. I look forward to seeing him back there.

It’s tough to say Patrick Cehlin hasn’t had chances to be an important part of the offense here. He’s had ice time with other guys that ARE producing. He has skated with the Mueller’s and the Beck’s. He’s been on the power play units. He had a three point night on November 9th, with a goal and two assists, and he’s scored just one goal since then. One goal in 36 games. Scoreless in the last 25. In addition to invisibility on the scorer’s sheet, he’s been prone to errant passes, poor decisions, and the tendency to pass up shots (although, he’s not alone in that last affliction).

Andreas Thuresson had a 30 game goal-less streak back in the 10-11 season. As a 4th year player, despite that monstrosity of a dry spell, I can imagine that a visit to the ECHL probably wasn’t an option on the table for him. For Cehlin as a rookie, a quick trip to Cincy I think is a much easier sell. He can go down there, try to get some confidence back, hopefully have some success, and he’ll come back with the “Dexshow Bump”. (TM)

Easier sell, sure. But I’m still surprised they actually went through with it.

I suppose if there ever was a time to do it, now would be the time. The team is as healthy as it has been in awhile, and new players are popping up every week it seems. Winchester, Liambas, McGrattan…. Assuming the Predators bring McGrattan back up after the conditioning assignment is done, Cehlin may be on his way back to town at that point. He just needs to take care of business while he’s playing with the Cyclones…or it might be Jack MacLellan instead!

The other moves: According to the AHL website as of 3pm on Tuesday, Zoltan Hetenyi and Andre Bouvet-Morrissette were sent to Peoria as well. Zoltan assigned to Orlando, ABM loaned to Evansville. I have no analysis for this. It happened. The end.

I like the Ford move as well, but I also think that something like this came too late. Sort of like Evason keeping goalies in too long when things aren’t working as they should. There’s no doubt in my mind that the powers that be decided to finally get off the pot and do something about this ship that’s listing badly.

A question- will we see a ‘C’ stapled on Fordo’s chest? That would mean a demotion for Moore, but it may be effective in shaking things up further.

Kissing Lajunen goodbye could not have been a difficult decision. In my little circle, he was referred to as the invisible man. Maybe a change of scenery will create a spark in him, but I would bet that next year he’ll be back in Europe instead.

Hetenyi on loan? Making room in Cincy for a descending goalie perhaps? Who knows……

Side note – for those who have DirecTV, the Thursday game in Lake Erie is being broadcast on the Lake Erie FSN – channel 660! Unfortunately it’s not in HD though (the Bluejackets game is in HD the same night)

Being in Ouch’s circle,I do belive in all of his comments and would like to add a big “welcome home ” to Scott. I also am very happy to see a shake up in the Ads boat.
Great to see the new big guys on the ice ,also looking forward to watching Fordo in a Ads jersey.

My question; Does an ECHL team HAVE to loan a player if it’s a promotion? Could Orlando have told us to go pound sand when we asked for Liambas? I’m wondering if shipping Zoltan over there was more of a peace offering for Liambas, who doesn’t appear to be going anywhere soon. Also, not sure how the G’s were splitting time in Cincy, but maybe a move Nashville wanted just to get him some more playing time that he may not have been reciving with the ‘clones… Just my two cents!

Ford for Lajunen was an absolute steal for us. While I’m not in the afforementioned “circle” I do agree with the assessment that he is completely invisible (and that’s putting it nicely).

Unless I’m missing something, the two ECHL players were traded as well. Nashville no longer owns the contracts of them. Zoltan was sent to Orlando because that is St. Louis’ and Peoria’s ECHL affiliate.

haha feel bad for Cincy… the Florida Panthers called up San Antonio’s goalie Jacob Markstrom so San Antonio called up Brian Foster from Cincy. With Cincy losing Foster and Hetenyi, do they even have a goalie left?!?!

I could be wrong, but I believe ABM and ZH actually had contracts with Milwaukee, not Nashville. Can’t find either one of them with an NHL contract on capgeek.com. So Milwaukee then technically they traded those two along with Nashville trading Lajunen for Ford. ZH went to NP training camp, but my guess would be that was on a PTO sort of deal. Here’s a story from the Rivermen’s site that has some better explanation. http://rivermen.net/rivermen-headlines/428-rivermen-acquire-lajunen-for-ford/#.USO3FKUqa64

The Orlando Solar Bears are actually affiliated with the Minnesota Wild and Houston Aeros. The Evansville IceMen are affiliated with St. Louis and Peoria. What may have happened is Milwaukee loaned ZH to Orlando with Peoria having that understanding in the trade. According to the ECHL website, ABM is with Evansville.

As for Cincy goalie, they also have Houser, who is a Panthers prospect. He has played 12 games for them this season so far. ZH had played 13 for Cincy.

“The team has also acquired forward Andre Bouvet-Morrissett (pro: boo-VAY moor-EE-set) and goaltender Zoltan Hetenyi (huh-TEN-ee) from the Admirals in exchange for future considerations. Both players are currently playing in the ECHL and are not expected to join the Rivermen at this time. ”

Looks to me like they were traded, just nothing yet in return for them.

I was kind of surprised that Nashville would make this trade as it retards the development of Aronson, Bitetto, and even Roussel, all of which I thought were at least making small strides, that being said it will be great to have Ford’s experience back on the ice and in the lockerroom. This team looked all along to be lacking experience and toughness and the additions of Ford and Winchester will go a long way toward helping the team’s playoff chances. As far as trading Lajunen, a bag of pucks would’ve been a good deal, even a defensive forward should put the puck in the net once in awhile, would much rather have seen Reid or Ryan playing instead early on. As for Cehlin or McClellan, both of whom have played with good lines and accomplished little, hopefully by the time McGratten returns to Nashville one or both will have found their game in Cincinnati and be able to contribute. CreedFeed, nice shoutout on the DirecTV game, it will be nice to see how the boys do against a tough Lake Erie squad!

Aronson, Bitetto and COR all showed that they can play in the AHL. That is a step forward for all three. Ford gives Milwaukee more experience, more size and a right handed shot on the blue line. If Bitetto sticks with the Admirals, that is another step for him. Making the playoffs and getting to play is the last step those guys can get in the AHL. Ford can only block one of them.

I agree with Glenn about Cehlin and MacLellan. Cehlin doesn’t help the offense and MacLellan can’t play defense to save his life. I hope that McGratten plays in Milwaukee for awhile. He isn’t the best skater, but he can lay some major hits out there, a la Valentine!

The comment from Adsfan: ‘Ford gives Milwaukee more experiene, more size and a right handed shot on the blue line’, begs a question. What use is either a left or a right handed shot from the blue line when the defense spends more time behind the net than they do anywhere near the blue line? There are days it looks like eveyone has swapped positions, with defense playing forward and forwards covering the blue line.